Pages

Thursday, October 20, 2011

Okay, so as promised, I'm only going to highlight a few titles from my reading this month. If you're curious about what else I read, you can check it out at GoodReads. I read 54 books last month and most of them fell into the 'meh' category.

In my opinion, the best book I read last month was Ecstasy Untamed by Pamela Palmer. You can read my review of it over at GoodReads. Yes, I only gave it four stars, but as I said, the book only works if you have read the previous books in the series. Call it the former bookseller in me, if you'd like, but I think I should be able to pick up any book in a series and still know what's going on. This is not to say Palmer doesn't recap some crucial information, but the book loses a lot if you're not emotionally invested in the characters. It comes out on October 25th and if you've read the Feral Warrior series, this is an auto-buy.

The worst book I read in September has to be Darkest Fire by Tawny Taylor. I won't reiterate why, as you can read it for yourself here, but I definitely don't recommend it. This book was part of my attempt to tackle some of the older titles in my TBR journal. I'm finding that I'm more flexible about my reading selections now that I'm not working at Borders anymore.

Angels of Darkness and the Storm Born graphic novel both got five stars from me. I'll be honest, a large part of that rating for Storm Born was the artwork. I'd read Richelle Mead's novel back in the day, but I wasn't particularly thrilled with it and the sequel, Thorn Queen, has been languishing in my TBR for quite a bit. However, the prose of the graphic novel parses the novel down to its essence and the art elevates it with its beauty. Sea Lion Books is going to be at NY Comic Con this year and I'm going to see if I can pick up one of the loose issues at their booth. As far as Angels of Darkness is concerned, obviously I never got around to writing that longer review as my personal life took a dive into Shitsville. I stand by everything I said over at GoodReads and I rec it for any paranormal fan who likes their stories with a dash of grit and darkness.

On Thea Harrison's recommendation, I bought Ilona Andrews's Silver Shark. I'm a big Andrews fan so I was willing to spend the money. It's a space romance, different from Andrews's normal fare, and unusual in narrative. However, there were times when it could have benefited from some editing as certain parts were confusing and there were several noticeable typos. It kinda killed any desire I had to go back and read the first book or purchase something else. So I wouldn't necessarily recommmend it, but I do hope Andrews eventually decides to revisit this world in a proper novel.

At the beginning of the month, I read Janye Castle's (aka Jayne Ann Krentz) Canyons of the Night. It was when I wrote the review for this book that I realized something was admiss. I'd always thought that Amaryllis, Zinnia, and Orchid were connected to the Harmony series. After all, they both focus on humans wiwth psychic powers tht arrived on the planet via a 'Curtain.' I started re-reading the older books and discovered the flower books are set on the world of St. Helens. It's funny, but I kinda feel like Krentz plagurized herself. I mean, Orchid was published in 1998 and the first Harmony book, After Dark, was published just two years later in 2000. To make myself feel better, I've started pretending that the Curtain opened up once and several colony ships went through, each to a different planet. I post-it noted several sections of my copy of Amaryllis for comparison purposes, but it got packed away as I prepared my room for new windows. I would like to do a more in-depth look at some point.